


bubblegum

by inf1nitum



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, F/M, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:47:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27188848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inf1nitum/pseuds/inf1nitum
Summary: audrey blanchard was born a witch - with magic flowing in her veins and witchcraft deep in her bones, potions and spells etched in her soul. unfortunately, she was, also, born a half-veela. {year 1 - year 7} { harry potter x oc }
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Original Female Character(s), Harry Potter/Original Character(s), Harry Potter/Original Female Character(s), Harry Potter/Other(s)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	1. 000

AUDREY BLANCHARD ALWAYS HAD BEEN a mix of bubblegum, pop music and a bit too much prettiness.

The first time that she made a boy blush she had been five and little Edward White had asked for one of her crayons – and she had given him a smile, bright enough to make the boy fall from his chair. Since then, little Audrey Blanchard had been a hurricane around boys (and some girls), full of big smiles and sassy winks that, most often than not, landed her in trouble.

Because Audrey Blanchard was born different.

Of course, this could be mean she was born a witch – like her beloved father – with magic flowing in her veins and witchcraft deep in her bones, potions and spells etched in her very soul. But, in her world, that was normal, and thousands of children around of the world were born with all those things every year.

But Audrey being Audrey, of course things wouldn't be as simple as being born a witch in a long line of other witches. Her father, of course, the extra drama queen he was, really had to make things worse for baby Audrey and make her mother a veela.

Beautiful creatures, the veelas, with the appearance of a dashing blonde woman whose looks could make any man feel at their feet. Except by the fact they aren't humans, and Audrey always had those disturbing thoughts in the back of her mind of how in hell her father would thought a good idea to have sex with a non-human creature who, when angry, turned in a bad bad bird who breathed fire.

But the point is, something in the middle of the last decade – you know, crazy 1970s – her father – famous, rich heir who liked outrageous clothes and cheesy pick-up lines, but had been a very handsome young man in his twenties – had found himself a lost veela in the middle of Beverly Hills and got the damn thing pregnant, and that was how Audrey was born.

Her grandparents had been scandalised. Baby Audrey, in her mother womb (do Veelas have wombs?) probably had been too. Things went downfall very quickly this point onwards – her mother had left her with daddy Mr. Blanchard and disappeared, because apparently veelas aren't keen in keeping in touch with human flings – and baby Audrey had been raised by a less than prepared father.

Ezra Blanchard wasn't a bad father if we must be fair. He was kind, and considered, and always liked to spend time with his daughter, but he just wasn't cut to raise someone, since he couldn't even be responsible by himself. Maybe he would be a nice uncle – you know, the one who teach you how to drive and which beers are good and the ones who aren't, but not a dad.

Then you see the problem.

The moment Audrey was born, even if she had been an adorable baby – all pink cheeks and big, blue eyes – she was a responsibility and Ezra Blanchard wasn't good with those. Then, by the time Audrey was old enough, he had shipped her to the other side of the world, to a boarding school in England, under the pretext of Hogwarts – what kind of name was that? – was where he studied.

Audrey didn't care for any of this bullshit. She was more worried by the fact that her father had shipped her alone to another country – England, dear Lord, are she going to have tea? She hated tea – to a school full of normal people – you know, under the wizard normal status – where she was no meant to talk about her heritage.

God forbid someone to discover the things that her father liked to do in his Manor, in Beverly Hills, far away from the judgement of his parents.

Like you know, fuck a non-human being, and have a daughter with said non-human being.

And this is how Audrey Blanchard – heiress to crazy bachelor Ezra Blanchard, sixth biggest fortune in magic Europe – got herself giving dirty looks to Hogwarts Express every single year.


	2. 001

**PART ONE: FADING**  
where she has to found herself  
{1991 - 1993}

* * *

**I**

"I have to do _what_?"

"You have to run straight at the wall, _darling",_ her grandmother said with the same ice-cold voice she used to everything that annoyed her in the slightest. In the few days Audrey had spent in London, safely tucked in her grandparents mansion – the old and fancy Blanchard House – had been enough to grasp a lot of things about Mrs. Evelyn Blanchard, the matriarch of her family; first, she was a tall, elder witch with grey hair always in a tight bun, and second, she had no patience with children at all.

And normally adults loved Audrey. She was educated, pretty and knew when to shut up. What more an adult could ask from an eleven-year-old?

But while her charm worked in almost anyone over eighteen-year-old – just bat her eyelashes and make some cute comment that would make all the adults go _"oooh, isn't she cute?",_ Evelyn Blanchard (who hated being called grandma) was immune to anything that Audrey tried. She was a wall of ice and pragmatism with no time to spend with her only granddaughter.

"You want me to run into a wall?!", Audrey squalled. She wasn't a girl who complained easily about stuff – she liked to think of herself as overall lucky, and when _not lucky,_ complaining never helped much – but asking her to run into a wall was a bit too much. If she were back at home, she had sure Ilvermony would never ask her to be part of such mess.

How gauche, running into walls. Had Hogwarts any finesse?

"I always knew my son was a bit of a useless excuse of wizard but had him failed to raise you to be any less stupid than him?", Evelyn cut her with no remorse. "Just run in the wall, silly girl. We don't have all day, it's just magic. I'm sure you know magic".

Audrey huffed, and her fingers curled around the cart with her heavy trunk – her grandmother had made her pack her things three times, until all of her clothes had been perfectly folded, and scolded Audrey at least a thousand of times for almost forgetting something. "I'm a very bright girl. I won an estate award for my last essay, thank you very much", she sassed.

Because it was true. Audrey wasn't stupid; of course, she hated maths with everything in her (after all, the numbers never made sense and it wasn't her fault1), but she excelled in almost everything else.

Her grandmother's nostrils flared in anger. "Audrey, run at the wall".

"No".

Audrey was sure Evelyn was close to physically hitting her.

But you see, it wasn't she was trying to be difficult (even if Audrey could be difficult sometimes), but she was angry. Terrible, awfully angry, with so much anger and resentment burning just under her skin, because her dad – who she always thought to be cool and all that – had woken up in the beginning of the summer and said:

 _"_ _I enrolled you at Hogwarts"_

Just that. No excuse, no _whys,_ or _I'm sorry._ Just one "you are going to Europe in late August, darling, now can you pass me the maple syrup, please?"

Audrey cried and made the biggest scandal her lungs could do. Then she cried some more, went on a hunger strike, and even tried to run away from home. Audrey even tried to argument or convince her dad – and she was very good convincing people to do what she wanted – but all her attempts had been futile. Apparently, her father didn't like her any more.

What other reason was to send your only daughter to another country for almost all year?

Audrey always wanted to go to Ilvermony, with her friends – Cal, and Liz and _even_ Betty Fairchild, who cut her hair once when they were six years old, but suddenly she was the only one shipped to Hogwarts, where her dad had graduated before flying away from UK as soon as he could.

"For Merlin's sake, Audrey, just run at the wall before I throw you into it!", Evelyn threatened, her grey eyes – same eyes that Audrey's dad had, but completely different from her own blue ones – swirling with anger. "I'm not saying it again!"

"Great. Do you think any of grandpa's owls are quickly enough to get to Ilvermony before the start of term? I'm sure I'm not going to run into walls there! Problem solved!".

Audrey tried her best smile. The one that make boys blush, girls lost her words and her dad buy her the new Barbie's dreamhouse – you know, the one that was almost her height. Audrey never knew if that smile was one of her things – a ability born with her, to bend people to her will, or if it was one of the _mom's thing._

Like her hair – melted silver, even if her dad was black-haired, or like eyes, or like the fact that she had not inherited the aquiline nose that all the Blanchards had. In fact, no one knew exactly what things Audrey had got from her mother – she never knew anyone like her, and her dad had no idea what else was in her blood but fair hair and pretty eyes.

So far, she had never spite fireballs and neither had transformed into an angry bird. Again, overall lucky.

Evelyn was ready to chop off her granddaughter's head (Audrey could almost see smoke coming out of her head). Audrey had never been surer of being ahead of a near-death experience – even worse than when she fell into an almost frozen lake in the middle of winter holiday when she was eight. Her dad had never been scary – a bit crazy, untrustworthy sometimes, but harmless as a little bunny – but his mother could define the meaning of scare.

Audrey ended running into the wall, trunk and cat and everything else.

And even if she was seething angry, furious even, with a lot of tears still stuck in her throat, Audrey took time to admire the magnificence of Hogwarts Express. She had seen trains, of course she had, but never paid much attention to them – old beasts of metal and smoke, roaring by the country. Audrey liked the elegance of her dad's expensive muggle cars better, with the feeling of the leather under her fingertips and the windows she could open and feel the wind in her hair.

But the Hogwarts Express was something else, painted in black-and-red, almost too shiny to be built by anything else than magic itself, reflecting the warm sunlight that gently peaked from the glass ceiling. It was imposing and powerful and all the things that wizards and their world are meant to be, and Audrey let herself admire it.

The platform ¾ was something else too, filled with a crowd of new and old students and their families, their voices mixed with the sound of owls and cats. The magic was impregnated all way around her, and she could fill her own under her skin, running in her veins.

Audrey never had paid much attention to the fact she was a witch. It was something as normal as being a girl, or being blonde, or being a half-human. Being a witch was intrinsic and one of the things that defined Audrey Blanchard as Audrey Blanchard, but being there, in the way to school – even if wasn't the school she wanted – made her think of what it meant.

Bubbling magic in her veins, with power in her hands. All the things she could do, the impossible, amazing things that being a witch meant.

"You are going to be late", Evelyn said somewhere behind Audrey, "if we don't find you a compartment soon".

"And Blanchards are never rude enough to be late", she repeated. Her grandmother hands – pale, and bony, with long, elegant fingers full of expensive rings – latched in her shoulders, and guided Audrey between the crowd. Somewhere, she heard a boy talking about not being a monitor, and someone was gossiping about the boy they meet in the summer.

They found her a compartment by the end of the train, still empty, and Evelyn put her trunk in the train with a flicker of the wand she always kept hidden in her sleeve, while Audrey hold the Cat's cage as hard as she could. She would be damned if her cat got lost in the middle of the train.

"Now, listen. Don't get in trouble; and we don't care in which house they put you if you get good grades. For Merlin's sake, Audrey, remember you are the Blanchard heiress. You must behave accordingly. Therefore, I hope to not receive any letters of poor conduct. I'm clear?"

Audrey looked to her grandmother. Really, really looked. Evelyn used to be a beauty in her younger years – Audrey had seen the pictures in the Mansion, but it wasn't the beauty that made her famous.

Was her ruthless mind and the cunning ways to get her family in the top of the world.

Audrey could respect that.

Respect her rules was another completely different thing.

"I will try", she said, in her best honey sweet voice, wearing a charming smile and all. Had Evelyn been anyone else, Audrey would probably have got a pat in the head and a compliment for that.

But Evelyn was Evelyn and never liked Audrey very much. She shot the girl a withering gaze. "Audrey, I'm serious. If Albus send one word of bad conduct, I'm sending you to Durmstrang, and don't think your father are going to help you out, because he isn't the brightest of the sons I had, but not even him is that stupid".

"Okay, gran. I'm going to be a good, nice, girl. Is that fine?"

"You better, for your own good", Evelyn sighed and closed the train door. "Goodbye, Audrey. Send word, darling".

"Yeah. Bye, Evelyn"

Audrey wasn't going to waste any drop of ink writing to home. No. Nope.

No way. They didn't deserve her calligraphy – she had worked really hard on it, until she could write with a quill as good as she could with pen, and then even better, and she wasn't planning on using her abilities to write stuff to her family, who probably despised her.

Maybe was one of the _mom's things._

Or maybe Audrey was just useless enough that not even her dad – who was her favourite person in the world – could bear living with her.

Audrey sat by the little window, and her eyes watched as Evelyn – with her perfect grey hair and beautiful crimson dress, went away, until she disappeared. The last two weeks she had spent in London, with her grandparents, had been the most she had spent away from home. Audrey used to visit, as a little kid, but never without her dad and never to spend the whole year in a new school without any of her friends.

Her throat burned.

Cat meow from her cage, big, yellow eyes craved into Audrey, as if trying to say, " _Are you going to let me lock up in here all day?"_

The girl sighed, before quickly opening the cage. Cat, the cat, was a big American bobtail that Audrey had got as a gift from her last anniversary in the last February. Since then, Cat had become her best friend.

"At least you aren't going to leave me, are you?"

Cat meowed again, with her yellowish eyes.

The door compartment slid open with a little screech. Audrey instinctively hugged Cat tighter; she had no idea how Hogwarts students are. Do they pick on the younger girls? Are they going to make fun of her because she had an accent? Can they find out who her mother is?

Audrey was ready to throw Cat to anyone who dared to annoy her when a round, baby faced boy around her age came in. He was probably a bit shorter than Audrey, with a mass of blonde hair in his head and a dread-stricken face by the fact the compartment he chooses had a girl on it. "S-sorry".

She smiled. Not her golden-winning smile, the one that probably was going to kill the boy, but her I'm-nice smile. "Do you want to sit? I'm all alone".

He looked unsure, shuffling his feet, before deciding by himself and sitting down in the seat in her front. Audrey smiled a bit more, just to be sure. People liked when she smiled. "I'm Audrey", she stretched one of her hands, and Cat hissed.

The boy flushed a deep red, before taking her hand in his in a sloppy handshake. "Neville. Neville Longbottom. Are you – ", he cleared his throat, "are you a first year too?"

"Yeah. And this is Cat, the cat. She doesn't like boys, so it's better if you don't pat her, but she is a nice girl".

 _Are you going to be my friend?_ Audrey wanted to scream. Neville looked sheepishly, and a bit of too soft, with his baby fat and round face, but Audrey had no friends here. She wanted friends.

"Oh, yeah", he looked to the cat in her arms. Then his hands went to one of his pockets, and Audrey made a confuse frown. "This is Trevor".

She almost screamed because Trevor was a toad. Not a nice, cute cat, nor a funny, small rat, but a toad. She had never ever put her hands in a toad, and honestly, they looked a bit weird and all that. She gulped and tried a smile, because Neville wasn't that bad, and he probably liked his toad.

Oh well, at least that thing was going to be in his dormitory and not in hers.

"Hello Trevor!", she squawked and hugged Cat a bit closer, just because she wasn't looking exactly happy about the other animal. Audrey was a bit scared of Cat jumping in the boy just to catch the toad and that was not how you start a friendship.

The door of the compartment opened again, just as the train started to walk. This time, it was a girl, with bushy, brown hair and already wearing the Hogwarts uniform that had made Audrey wrinkle her nose the first time she had seen it. Her dark eyes went from Neville to Audrey at least twice before she made up her mind. "Hey. Sorry, almost all the other compartments are full. Can I sit there?"

Audrey quickly thought that the probabilities of this girl having some weird pet too are low, so she smiled the best she could. "Yeah, sure! I'm Audrey Blanchard, and this is Neville Longbottom. What's your name?"

The girl looked at her. "Blanchard, like Edward Thorne-Blanchard? I've read about him; his spells are famous and very interesting. I hope they teach some of them to us, not in the first year, of course, but would be terrible useful to know some of them. Anyway, I'm Hermione Granger".

Audrey blinked.

"Yeah, I think he is my great-grandfather or something like that".

Hermione sited down by her side and folded her hands in her lap. "I'm so excited to see Hogwarts! I've read all about it in Hogwarts: A History, because I wanted to know the rules, and the history of the castle – do you know how old the castle is? – and how everything works, because you know, no one in family is magic at all. I'm so excited, because Hogwarts is the best magic school that exists, and having a good education is a decisive factor in life success."

Audrey blinked again and looked at Neville. He didn't look like he had read Hogwarts: A History either.

"My family is almost all magic, I think", Audrey said. "But I thought I was going to another school. Not Hogwarts".

"Are you American?", Hermione asked, suddenly curious. "I've read about some schools of witchcraft in America! Are they as good as Hogwarts, aren't they?"

Audrey blinked again. That girl could speak, and _fast_.

And was in her moment of shock by the quickly paced speech of Hermione Granger that everything went to hell, because Cat choose her owner's moment of listlessness to pounce directly into Neville's arms, where Trevor, the toad, was being safely kept.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> its 4a.m i should be sleeping but i've wrote probably 15 pages for this fanfiction. next chapter will be up tomorrow or after that, depends on how quickly i can edit it.  
> also, english isn't my first language. i'm writing this fanfiction not just for fun, but because i need to improve my writing skills (and also because i'm locked in my house since march because of covid-19). if you find any mistakes, please feel free to point them. thank you so much, and please stay safe out there.  
> love,  
> star.


	3. 002

**II**

* * *

When Audrey had been six-year-old, she had got in a stupid feud with Betty Fairchild, a pureblood girl whose mother was an old friend of Audrey's dad. She couldn't remember the reason by the life of hers – maybe it was a doll, maybe it was because Audrey had made fun of Betty's freckles. Either way, Betty had got really, angry and waited until Audrey had been busy writing – even then, she loved writing – to cut her beloved blonde braid.

Audrey cried for hours and hours; now, it looked a bit silly, but for six-year-old Audrey, her hair meant the world because it was the same hair that her mum – the mum she never knew and probably never would – had, and the hair that made her dad fall in love, like in those fairytales she liked a bit too much.

This day was the first time that Audrey's magic had worked. In the next morning, her hair grown twice as long and twice as thick, a long mane of molten silver in big curls in her back. In the end, her dad said Betty cutting her hair had been a good thing, because proved she was a witch.

Not a half-veela nor half-human, but a witch with magic of her own.

They're always a rainbow in the corner, cupcake, her dad had said, clasping his hands together. Your mum broke my poor, little heart, but I have you now. You just need to find your own rainbow!

She liked to think of herself as a natural optimist.

Little Audrey Blanchard always had taken everything that life had thrown at her and did the best she could. She had this uncanny dexterity to adapt, changing herself in face of need; maybe another of the mom's things that haunted her very much.

After all, even if she never wanted to go to Hogwarts, she had gone. Angry and hurt and everything else, she was enduring, just like she always did with everything else. After all, at eleven-year-old she had endured a life hiding who she was and what kind of blood was in her veins, dealing with some strange powers that are bound to get worse as old she got.

But when her first days at Hogwarts started as pure and utterly hell, she thought to herself – to the hell with rainbows.

And everything started with a cat, a toad, and a hat.

In the middle of Hogwarts Express, Cat screamed like the world was on fire, jumped from Audrey's arms – and she screamed too, more from the shock than anything else – and went directly at poor Trevor, Audrey forced herself to think that something good would come from the fact that her cat pursued the poor toad all the way in the compartment and then out, to the rest of train, and Neville was a wreck, holding tears and Hermione was completely lost.

"Cat! Cat!", Audrey screamed, but the feline couldn't care less, big yellow eyes fixed on his prey, and Audrey's cheeks were burning in embarrassment. Hermione tried to hold off Cat just to get her arms scratched, Neville squealed and then both pets are out of the compartment, in the middle of the train.

Audrey was near to tears at this point because now… Now neither Hermione nor Neville would want to her friends.

"It's okay, Neville, Trevor is smart", Hermione tried. "We can separate and go searching, right? Then we can find both Trevor and…"

"Cat. The cat's name is Cat".

Hermione looked at Audrey like she was crazy.

"Aren't you muggleborn?", Audrey asked. "Like Breakfast at Tiffany's. You know, Audrey Hepburn? She is my namesake. Cat's name is supposed to be a joke"

She wasn't lying. In her last birthday, her dad had got her a kitten because Audrey had been nothing but a loss around any kind of cute animal. She had almost cried, because her dad never had let her have any familiar before – "I'm allergic, dear! Why don't we buy you a new plushie, uh?" – and she had been asking for one for some time. Ecstatic over her new best friend, Audrey had found herself in a dire situation: she had no idea about how name her kitten.

Her dad had laughed and let her watch the movie, and they decided to call the kitten Cat, as an inside joke, after he told her from where her name come. "I used to think Audrey Hepburn was the most beautiful woman in the world, before I met your mother, of course. I thought her name would suit you"

But now Cat's name left a bad taste in the back of her throat. Maybe she should change it.

"I'm pretty sure we shouldn't be allowed to watch Breakfast at Tiffany's", Hermione dismissed. "Doesn't matter. We need to find Trevor and Cat, before any of them get hurt. C'mon".

And then she was out of the compartment, bushy hair and Hogwarts's skirt dancing behind her. Audrey looked at Neville for a moment, gulped, and felt bad. "I'm sorry, Neville. I'm really sorry".

Audrey spent half of her way to Hogwarts looking for the two lost familiars, her chest aching in both embarrassment and worry. What if Cat, who was usually very chill animal, had hurt poor Trevor? Audrey even felt bad for thinking of the toad as weird. She probably would be giving him a hug as soon as they found the pets.

Around midday, she spent all the money she had in her pockets buying all the sweets Neville could want because she really had no idea about how to ask sorry again (Hermione said she should've had kept Cat in her cage, and Audrey felt even worse), and they left to keep searching. Then Hermione started saying all the kinds she knew about felines, like they can get sick by drinking milk in her quickly and matter-of-fact voice, like a recorder.

Then she went on asking if Audrey knew anything about the four Houses – for which her answer was a solely "my dad was in Hufflepuff, but all the rest of the family was in either Gryffindor or Ravenclaw, what is cool, I think" – and then she went in very long speech about why she thought that Gryffindor would be beneficial for her development as a young girl.

Audrey wasn't stupid, but that girl was something else entirely. But better bossy Hermione, who knew her way around any subject, than Neville in bring of tears. Audrey never knew what to do with crying people.

Together, they went from cabin to cabin trying to find either Trevor or Cat. Hermione would throw her questions from student to student, unabashed, while Audrey stayed a bit behind, playing with the rim of her skirt – the nice one her grandmother had bought her when she arrived in London, not the terrible thing that Hogwarts would make them wear.

Audrey never liked plain, boring black.

"Has anyone seen a toad or a big, fluff, brown cat? Neville and Audrey had lost their pets", Hermione said probably by the fifth time, opening another compartment door. By this time, Audrey could swear she knew the train by heart, the sound of the sliding doors and all that.

"We've already told him we haven't seen it", said one of the two boys in the cabin. Audrey played a bit more with her skirt, and peeked over Hermione's shoulder; the compartment had only two occupants, both of them probably around her age, even if the boy with messy black hair – Merlin forbid her grandmother ever seen a child with hair like that – looked smaller enough to be too young for Hogwarts.

Then her eyes grew twice in size, because the one with the pretty hair – flaming red, shining like cobalt with the sunlight – had his wand firmly clutched in his hand. "Hey, I'm Audrey, can I see what you are going to do?"

Both boys took their eyes from Hermione to her. She shuffled her feet and smiled sheepishly. Hermione didn't give the boys time to react, only sitting herself in the compartment, her dark Hogwarts robes dancing around her. For being a muggleborn, clearly not accustomed to robes, Hermione could use hers way better than Audrey did. "Let's see it, then", Hermione said.

"Er – all right", and the boy looked taken aback. "Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow, turn this stupid, fat rat yellow."

Audrey cringed. Of course, she wasn't a full-grown witch and wasn't even near that, but being born in the magic world and probably couldn't do much more than that to save the life of hers, but Audrey at least knew spells aren't meant to sound like that.

Hermione instantly started her rant about how she learned all the course by heart, with her voice way too quickly to grasp everything. Audrey smiled apologetically at the two boys, who looked as lost as she did; honestly, she hadn't open none of her books, and she doubted that they did either.

"I'm Hermione Granger", the girl said, "and this is Audrey Blanchard. Who are you?"

"I'm Ron Weasley", the red-haired boy said, still stunned by the speed of her speech. Audrey noted he had something stuck at his nose.

She almost laughed thinking of her grandmother having a fit about this.

"Harry Potter", the other boy said meekly, his big, green eyes shining in something as embarrassment. Audrey held her breath – of course, she had been raised in a completely different world than most of her peers, in the other side of a ocean, in a city built by sun and the blur of stars, but even her knew who Harry Potter was.

She couldn't remember, of course, the day he had become famous, because she had been a toddler back then, worried with her toys and napping times. But she had heard, picked things here and there; usually, her dad hated talking about the war, and he never had spent time talking about those days with her.

But Audrey wasn't stupid. She had seen the pictures he kept in his office – the two older brothers who had been declared MIA back at then, with their bodies never found after a mission as Aurors. And most of all, she remembered the picture of the only relative who had some actual resemblance with Audrey – Eloise Blanchard, her aunt, who shared with Audrey the same dimples in the cheek and the same catlike eyes.

Eloise Blanchard who had been killed at sixteen years old in the year prior of the Voldemort demise.

Audrey always had goosebumps looking at her pictures. Eloise had been terrible young, brave, and intelligent by what her dad had told her and had been killed despite being the youngest daughter of a very old, very powerful pureblood line.

All before little Harry Potter had come along.

She always knew he was around her age, but she never had made the math. She had no idea he would be in her class.

"Really?", she squealed. "Ooooh, that's nice. I've heard about you".

He turned his eyes to her, suddenly looking really uncomfortable. "Yeah. Uhm, do you have an accent?"

"No. You do"

"I know all about you, of course — I got a few extra books for background reading, and you're in Modern Magical History and The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century." Hermione stopped they, suddenly very excited to be talking about books. Where the heck had she found time to read all of it? Audrey liked to read, but not things like that.

She liked things like Nancy Drew and The Baby-Sitter's Club. You know, the sappy things that muggles would write and girls like her would read in their bay window, definitely not heavy textbooks filled with dates (she hated dates) and names.

"Am I?", Harry asked, and Audrey almost pitied the boy.

"Goodness, didn't you know, I'd have found out everything I could if it was me", and Audrey really couldn't take Hermione's reason – had been her, she probably would have ordered every book with her name on it just to know what are people talking about her (what if someone had found her embarrassing baby pictures?).

"Do either of you know what House you'll be in? I've been asking Audrey, and I hope I'm in Gryffindor, it sounds by far the best; I hear Dumbledore himself was in it, but I suppose Ravenclaw wouldn't be too bad... Anyway, we'd better go and look for the pets. You two had better change, you know, I expect we'll be there soon. Are you coming, Audrey?"

"Yeah", Audrey answered automatically. "If any of you guys see my cat, can you please hold her? She is nice, I swear, and I'm going to cry until next year if she got lost. Anyway, nice to meet you, guys. Bye!".

Then they left, with Neville hot in their trail and Audrey bit her lip. She had never spent a lot thinking about which house she would be just sorely because she couldn't care less. Her dad had made a fuss talking about what he liked in Hufflepuff – something about the nice common room and the closeness to the Kitchens – but Audrey hadn't paid him any mind.

If she only knew.

"Can you believe? Harry Potter is in the train", Neville said. "I didn't know he would come to Hogwarts this year".

"Well, Hogwarts is the only magic school in Britain, isn't? Where else his family would send him?", Hermione said promptly. "Hey, Audrey, I think its better if you go change. Neville and I can keep looking around; anyway, I suppose they will check the train after we left to get our luggage, so at some point someone is going to find Cat and Trevor".

Audrey whispered loudly and went to change.

Things could be worse, she thought to herself, while getting her uniform in her trunk and going to the bathroom. Hermione could be a bit petulant and even pedantic, but she was overall nice, and friendly enough to try and help her and Neville when the culprit of all this mess was solely Audrey.

Maybe she would want to be friends with Audrey.

Things couldn't be that bad.

If she only knew.

* * *

The rest of the travel was eventful. At some point, Hermione had left and found Cat curled up in the back of the train and coaxed her out of her hiding spot, and Audrey had hunt down the trolley lady to buy Hermione some chocolate as to say thank you, to which the girl only dismissed saying sugar would rot her teeth – something about her parents being both dentists. Then she went in a run down of how Harry Potter and his red-headed friend were already getting in trouble (Audrey made a mental note to stay the hell away from them).

The blonde girl made sure to lock Cat safely in her little cage.

They found Trevor hiding in a compartment full of seventh years who thought he was funny, and Neville had been ecstatic to have his toad back, only for him to run away again half an hour later. This time she at least had sure it wasn't her fault.

Audrey watched how the landscape slowly changed until all she could see was the purple sky after the sun had set and a lot of mountains. She never had been the best at geography, but she knew Hogwarts was somewhere in Scotland – and she never had been in Scotland before.

Definitely far away from home. Her chest hurt a bit while she thought about that.

Audrey slowly crawled her way out of the train, following all the other students that are fulfilling the corridor, with their conversations mixing up in the air, excited voices trailing about the new school year. She found herself in a small platform, flanked by Neville (still without Trevor) and Hermione, and the wind made her hair became a huge mess.

"Firs' years! Firs' years over here! All right there, Harry?" Someone called, and Audrey followed the voice to find the biggest man she had ever seen. He was at least twice her dad's size, with a big hairy face and dark eyes; his voice was as deep as thunder, reverberating over the little first years following him, stumbling in their feet and new robes in a narrow path.

How far was Hogwarts, after all? She knew it was a castle, but would the school made then walk for miles until they found it? Why couldn't Hogwarts have a train station nearer their gates?

On Audrey's side, Hermione almost slipped a couple of times. By half of the way, the girls intertwined their arms to steadily themselves.

Suddenly, her eyes – still adapting to the low lights – fixed on a great lake, with calm and dark waters directly reflecting the full moon. "Do you think they will make us swim?", she murmured to Hermione, who shrugged.

"Unlikely. Look better, here are small boats on the lake".

But her eyes were already occupied, transfixed in the first vision of the castle – just the cutout of the many towers and turrets against the starry sky, in the top of one of the highest mountains. It looked like a painting, straight from one of the fairytales she liked to read as a child.

"No more'n four to a boat!", the man shouted, and Audrey followed Hermione to a boat with two other girls, while Neville went with Harry Potter and Ron Weasley. But Audrey's mind was somewhere else, still enchanted by the vision of the castle ahead of her; she doubted that even Ilvermony was that beautiful, and she hadn't even seen Hogwarts totally.

Even Hermione, who always had something to say, was rendered speechless.

They clambered out of the little boats in an underground harbour, and Audrey made sure to keep herself steady and don't fall – how embarrassing that would be, when she heard their responsible saying he had found a toad. The girls smiled to each other, and Audrey made a pray to Neville keep the familiar safe and sound now.

All the little first years were put in a small chamber off the hall – who was probably the biggest hall Audrey had ever seen – by a tall, strict-looking witch with black hair in a bun and green robes. Audrey was way too close for comfort to a boy with blonde hair even fairer than hers – she thought for a second if he was a half-veela too – and Neville.

Professor McGonagall reminded Audrey a bit of her grandmother. Both had this look in their face of someone you don't want to cross – or the consequences would be grave – and voices that could make a crowd shut the hell up in minutes. She started the speech welcoming them to Hogwarts and talking about a Sorting Ceremony and that made Audrey really, nervous.

What are they expecting her to do? Maybe she would have to do a test? Answer questions about herself?

Audrey felt sick with the anxious. Why couldn't let they choose their own House? Why someone thought it was a good idea to label a bunch of eleven-year-olds with characteristics they would probably grow out in the next year?

At least she hoped she would. All her teenage books said she would have a growth spurt around next year or something like that and become a whole different person. Growing up and things like that.

Oh, and Hogwarts had ghosts. Ghosts. She had never seen a ghost back home – her dad would tell her stories of some nasty ones his father had found while travelling around the world – but she thought they were cool; at least the ones who greeted the first ones with some kindness.

Ghosts couldn't be that dangerous. Adults wouldn't let dangerous things around a school full of kids, right?

Right.

But if Audrey thought the exterior of the castle was breathtaking, the Great Hall was something else entirely, almost out of the muggle movies her dad would like to watch with her sometimes, a beautiful painting in so many colors. It was alive and drenched in magic, from the candles floating (she totally was going to ask to have those in her room, at home) to the tables, filled with older students – too many to count, even if Audrey didn't have dyscalculia.

But the best was the ceiling – it looked like a window directly to the core of the Milky Way, with the dark night sky looking like expensive velvet, dotted with little, silver stars like the sky had their own ghosts.

Behind her, Hermione whispered in her ear about the sky, "It's bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in Hogwarts: A History". Maybe Audrey should give a chance to heavy, boring textbooks if they could tell things about places like that.

In the end, the test that was making Audrey pretty much horrified was just as silly as anything she had ever seen. Just an old, plain, and patched hat, who looked as dirty as a rag. Couldn't someone from the staff use a cleaning spell or something like that in it?

But as ugly as it could be, in the end the Hat was magic as everything else around her, and it opened a very creepy mouth to sing a song. Audrey was too much anxious to truly appreciate it, but she thought it was supposed to be cool; a talking, singing hat, it was fitting for a school. Safe, like she thought.

Nothing to worry, really.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," Professor McGonagall said in her steady voice, "Abbott, Hannah!".

Abott, Hannah, was sorted in Hufflepuff just an instant after that. Audrey blinked, and then Professor McGonagall called, "Blanchard, Audrey".

She hurried, with the fingers playing around the rim of her skirt, a habit she could never let go since she was a small child, to the horror of her grandmother. Audrey gave McGonagall one of her award-winning smiles, just to be sure, but as she expected, it had no effect at all on the older witch. She sat in the stool with trembling legs and saw black.

"Oh, interesting. It was years since the last time we had someone like you… Half-veela, hm?", Audrey sucked air. "Don't worry, your secret is safe with me. Now, about the selection… Loyal, I see, the same downfall of your family. But you have too much fire to be a Hufflepuff. A bit of courage, not a bad mind… Maybe… Yeah, that's better… Where that mind of yours should be challenged because you have great things ahead of you…"

Audrey felt her heart in her throat, pulsing violently and she swore she was almost throwing up in the front of the whole school.

"SLYTHERIN!"

Audrey almost cried.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: i'm back. thanks for the reviews and to everybody who favorited this fanfiction, it means a lot, really.  
> about this chapter: this a MONSTER of chapter, its long and i honestly don't know if its boring. anyway, i don't know if i'm going to make all the chapters this long, but never expected anything short, because i like to write. anyway, i hope you like it!  
> as said before, english isn't my first language, and editing this is a pain, because i need to reread all the cringe stuff i wrote, and i usually use 2 grammar and spell checkers, but if you spot something wrong PLEASE feel free to correct me. it helps a lot!  
> anyway, i love audrey. she is a bit annoying as a 11-year-old, but she has a LONG way to go.


	4. 003

**III**

In her first night at Hogwarts, Audrey learned that Hogwarts knew how to throw a feast. In her last two weeks – spent in her grandparents' care – Audrey had noted how much different English food were and, despite the elves of her family best attempts, she had been very picky while eating.

But Hogwarts was having none of it. Audrey had eaten until she was sleepy and bloated.

After that, all the little first years – she couldn't let to notice she was going to be one of the tallest in her class, again – followed black-haired fifth girl by corridors that got darker and darker, until the depths of the castle; Audrey hadn't spent a moment thinking about where was she going to sleep, but even if she did, she could never have thought about a dungeon.

But Slytherin's dorms were in a dungeon, in the darkest part of the castle – where all the first years gathered together, standing as close as they could get, because who the hell would put a bunch of eleven-year-olds in a dungeon?

The door to the common room was a normal-looking stretch of a damp stone wall, who would slide aside as soon as you whispered the password – which the prefect reminded them to never tell to anyone out of Slytherin. Behind the magic door, the common room was quite neat, cast under a green light, full of expensive-looking chairs. Audrey shuddered looking at the skulls used in decoration, against dark wood cupboards; but the tapestries were quite nice to look.

"We are under the lake", Cathryn Murel, their prefect, had said, "sometimes the giant squid likes to say hello".

"Is there a giant squid?", a girl asked behind Audrey and all the others snickered. Well, she had never seen a giant squid as much as had never seen a normal-sized squid, but she supposed they would be cool.

The boys and girls had different dormitories, and the prefect send them to it. Audrey found the girls' dormitory was quite nice, almost homely, if she had to be honest – with four-posters bed in green-and-silver curtains, full of pillows. Their trunks were already there, as was Cat, looking at her from one of beds – the one closest to a window where she could see the water soft swirling around.

Apparently, her bed had already been chosen.

"Is that cat yours?", a girl asked. She had short, spiky black hair, with the ends cut irregularly, as if she herself made the cut using pointless scissors, dark skin, and bright green eyes. Audrey thought she looked cool.

"Yeah, her name is Cat, and she was my birthday gift", Audrey answered, sitting at her bed. Cat meowed loudly. "Do you want to pet her?"

"Sure. That's nice. I got a necklace as my birthday gift, what is stupid because I hate necklaces", the girl said, moving quickly to pet Cat. "I'm Sophie Roper".

Audrey smiled prettily, dangling her feet. Doing it was getting harder because she was growing fast. "Nice to meet you, Sophie. I'm Audrey Blanchard".

"I didn't know the Blanchards had children", another girl said, already trying to find something in her trunk. "I'm Pansy Parkinson, by the way".

"Uh, I grew up in California, with my dad. We only came here a couple of times. Dad says the weather makes his skin dry".

Pansy blinked. Her face reminded Audrey of a small, cute pug. "Oh, right. You are American. Ah, this is Daphne Greengrass; like yours, her family is like… super old, one of the twenty-eight sacred, and this is Millicent Bulstrode".

"Hi", Audrey said meekly. Daphne was conventionally pretty, with long blonde hair in a neat braid and a heart-shaped face. She smiled docile. But Millicent Bulstrode was completely another story. Audrey never had been small, but Millicent was probably twice her size in both weight and height, with a mean face like she was more probably to kill Audrey in her sleep than to make sleepover parties with her.

Pansy stopped her search for pyjamas and looked over her. "You are a pureblood, aren't you, Audrey? The Blanchards always had been a bit peculiar, but you look alright".

Her fingers played with the rim of her skirt, and she could swear her heart stopped a beat. "I suppose," she shrugged, trying to look nonchalantly. "I mean, mom's magic, but I don't know a lot about her".

That was the first thing that her dad had told her about lying – make it as close as it could get to the truth. Saying she was a pureblood was as far from the truth as saying she was a muggleborn, but saying she only knew her mom was magic wasn't that different from truth.

After all, her mother was a magic being. She just wasn't a human magic being.

"Oh, right", Pansy said, but it didn't look like it was _right._ "Can I use the bathroom first?"

She went quickly to change, without waiting for the answer. Sophie took her eyes out of Cat, narrowed them, and whispered as quietly as she could, "We half-bloods should stick together".

Audrey mulled it over a second, her heart incredible fast – of course Sophie Roper, with her cool hair and all that, wasn't like her, but she was offering something like a peace offering and not even Audrey was stupid enough to refuse that. "Yeah, we should".

And they did.

* * *

Despite being used to going to school – unlike most of the other girls, as she soon learned, Audrey discovered that Hogwarts was quite different from any school she had been before. The castle was huge, almost alive, impregnated by ancient magic and hundreds of staircase; moody doors and moodier ghosts (she had to run away from Peeves in her first morning), and full of portraits that most would often confuse her more than help anytime she would get lost.

And then was the fact that being in Slytherin meant a clearly uncomfortable fact: no one liked Slytherins. Their prefects had made clearly in her first morning – don't go anywhere alone, at least until you can defend yourself.

People would more easily glare at Audrey than greet her in corridors – despite her being perfectly cordial to anyone. Slytherin' students were always the perfect target to any prank that others house wanted to do. In her shared classes, not even the Hufflepuffs – who are supposed to be all sugar and no spice – would consort with Slytherins if they could avoid it.

She quickly learned the slytherin' answer for that. Her colleagues were, often, rude and crude to anyone outside their house, with their venom dripping over anyone who dared to stop in their way. Maybe by choice or by habit, but Slytherins were all rough, vicious, and passive-aggressive.

So, she did what was the best thing she could do: she kept herself as out of the radar as possible. Having Sophie Roper by her side was also an amazing thing – the girl was quick-witted, foul-mouthed and would happily watch her back if Audrey did the same.

Of course, the Gryffindors were the worst. Like water and oil, snakes and lions didn't mix, despite the staff's best efforts; no shared class nor activity would put they together and make them mix.

But, besides that, Hogwarts wasn't that bad. While evicting being subject of traps and pranks from other students, Audrey would gladly sit at fascinating classes. Charms had quickly become her favourite subject – was easy, and fun, and Flitwick seemed to like her. She liked Astronomy a lot, and despite being as difficult as it could, Transfiguration was rewarding since Audrey noted it was very much like writing – she just had to left her mind run free, picturing the perfect image of she needed to create.

However, potions' class was a mess. She had trouble measuring things, and even if Sophie tried to help her as she could, Audrey had sure she would pass Potions just because Snape did everything he could to help his own house, out of spite.

Snape was a terrible Professor. Audrey had met her fair share of cruel professors – she could remember Mrs. Clarke, from her third grade, who called her dumb in front of everyone because she couldn't do multiplication to save the life of hers – but Snape went beyond. He was petty and cruel, and had fun with that; fortunately, he also was Head of Slytherin House, so Audrey was most safe from his cruelties.

Her spare time would either be spent in the library, with Sophie – who liked to annoy Madam Pince – or outside, finding the best – and safer – places to read her muggle books safely hidden from the other snakes. As she quickly had discovered, they aren't keen with muggle things.

"What the hell is t _hat,_ Audrey?", Millicent had asked, when Audrey had accidentally let her copy of _Dear Sister_ (you know, Audrey could never resist another book of _Sweet Valley High_ ) in her bed. Audrey had been so scared of the disgust face of Bulstrode that she tried twice as hard to hide all her muggle teenage books.

Besides that, her life in Hogwarts wasn't bad. She would stay away from drama and trouble, read her books, and do her homework. If anyone come at her, Audrey would just run, stay hidden and don't come out until Sophie had sure they could get safely back to their common room. Every Thursday her grandmother would send her a letter, sometimes with new books that her dad asked her to buy. Her grandpa would also send her some gifts of his own, like lucky charms and home-made sweets – "everything to my little sun", that she would often share with Sophie.

Life wasn't good, but wasn't bad either.

* * *

In the beginning of November, when the weather had turned and Audrey discovered that Scotland was probably the coldest place she had ever been, Sophie got her first detention.

It wasn't intentional, but Sophie was much harder to control than Audrey. They had been trying to get in their Transfiguration's class in time – McGonagall hated backwardness – when they had been cornered by some second year Gryffindors. Audrey really had never got into trouble with them, but with the Quidditch season approaching, things were getting worse between the two houses – Gryffindor being allowed a first-year player – which never happened before – wasn't helping either; Slytherin was split between the ones who thought of it as a poor choice – "Potter can't be that good", and the ones who thought of it as absurd – "He is smaller, what makes him faster – and why can't our firsties have brooms too?".

And Audrey and Sophie being two lonely first-years wasn't helping either, because that made them easy target. Had been Audrey a bit older – and braver – she probably would have hexed them into oblivion, but she wasn't that skilled. Yet.

But Sophie was completely another story, because as soon as the two older boys started to laugh at them, even before they could say any spell, Sophie kicked one of them _there,_ grabbed Audrey and sprinted down the corridor as fast their legs could carry them.

Just to run into McGonagall, who had been livid because of Sophie's use of brute strength. Audrey had lost ten points for Slytherin, but Sophie had lost ten points and got a detention.

And that was the story of how Audrey had been all alone in a corner of the library in the evening, trying to get her homework done. She was having trouble with History of Magic dates – 1789 and 1987 looked the same for her, when she felt someone stop besides her.

Audrey took her eyes from her book to see Hermione Granger, the girl from the train, by her side, looking pretty unsure of herself. "I'm sorry", she said, "but Madam Pince said you have the last copy of 'Magic in XIV century Europe', and I, uh, need to do an essay for Professor Binns. Do you mind If… Sit with you?"

Audrey was a bit speechless. Hermione hadn't spoken with Audrey since they arrived in Hogwarts – at first, Audrey had thought she had been mad because the whole incident with Cat and all that, but then she had learned all about the bad blood between Gryffindor and Slytherin – which, apparently, Hermione had bought by heart as anything else magic-related. She couldn't believe that what would take for Hermione to actually break the ice was… a book.

Oh no, scratch that. Audrey could believe pretty much. She had seen Hermione in class – the girl was a machine that devoured textbooks like Audrey did with muggle fiction.

Audrey smiled. "Oh no, no problem at all! We can… Do it together? Anyway, you can sit, of course you can sit".

Hermione looked unsure by a moment – but Audrey was making room for her quickly, and Granger apparently made her mind, sitting as far away from Audrey as she could. The blond-haired girl just kept the smile on her face, no matter how uncomfortable she was. "Potter and Weasley aren't with you?"

That was a pattern that Audrey had noted in the last week. Suddenly Hermione – who would be seen alone most of the time – had started to keep herself glued with either Harry Potter or Ron Weasley, if not both. It was a strange friendship, but each with their own.

"Ron said he was going to play wizard chess with Seamus and Harry is…"

She stopped and narrowed her eyes.

"Training?", Audrey asked. "Everybody already knows he is on quidditch. Malfoy couldn't shut up about it in the common room – I think he is in love".

Hermione cracked a tiny smile at that. "Wood wanted to keep it a secret".

"Well, this is Hogwarts. I don't think you can keep anything a secret for too long here", Audrey shrugged. "Anyway. I've done some research about the muggle vision of magic in different European cultures, but I'm having trouble with the evolution of it through the years and the incorporation of magical superstitions in their cultures. Maybe we can work from there?"

Hermione looked a bit aloof, her bunny-teeth biting the lower lip. At some point, as someone who says _whatever,_ she finally loosened herself – probably deciding that Audrey wasn't a real threat.

"Oh, about it, it's very interesting…"

Sophie couldn't believe her eyes when, a week later, she found Audrey Blanchard and Hermione Granger siting together in a table of the library, both leaning over a heavy textbook about transfiguration. Audrey had her hair in a loose bun, her nose all scrunched up in the way it did when she tried to understand something really hard, but Granger looked perfectly comfortable.

Well, they hadn't really become friends. Something like acquaintances. Audrey learned that Hermione was more intelligent than she thought, thinking sharp as a knife and organising facts as easy as Audrey could sing Madonna's songs. They bounded over homework and school things, not a true friendship, but a strange fellowship that allowed Audrey to borrow Hermione some of her books.

They worked well together, and they respected each other.

But some weeks later, Hermione would arrive the library – full until the brink because of the older students, dragging Potter and Weasley with her. She seated herself by Audrey's side like it was the most natural thing in the world, and, when Weasley looked like she was _crazy,_ she just shrugged and said – "she is cool".

Audrey had never been prouder of herself.

Who said snakes and lions couldn't mix?

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: originally this chapter was completely different. audrey would get into the mix of the golden trio in the troll accident but honestly, i don't want her as part of the golden trio. she isn't a gryffindor and would never be; she is smart, and cunning and ambitious, and even if she isn't a coward, she has none of the that stupid braveness of theirs. she is going to have her own life, her own problems, her own adventures, and her own friends (like Sophie, who is a total badass).  
> anyway, with this chapter we are around chapters eleven-twelve from the first book. i want to finish this book as soon as possible because things gets more interesting in the later ones.  
> i hope you like this chapter! i have the next one ready, and i plan on posting it this week. thanks for everyone who had favourited and/or followed this story!  
>   
> with love,  
> star.


	5. 004

**IV**

The last months of the year passed as blur. Between her occasional study sessions with Hermione, keeping Sophie out of trouble – she had got in more and more fights since her first detention, and Audrey just knew that Snape was near to making an intervention of his own, Audrey had her full plate of worries.

And course, there was _that_.

The thing that took her long enough to see.

Maybe it wasn't clearly to anyone but her – being who she was, and it had taken months until the realization damned into her. Audrey had never met any others half-breeds – her dad said France had some regions with a good number of half-veelas, but they never had gone there. She had been isolated from everyone because of that – not that she liked to complain. Of course, being often different sucked – and not being able to talk about it only made worse.

She had felt alone her whole life because where else was she going to find anyone who would understand the fear under the skin of people discovering and treating you different because of that?

But she had been having herbology in a boring Wednesday, her fingers all dirt of soil and mud when probably out of boredom her mind gave a _click._ She stopped everything she was doing, put her hand on the air and said to professor Sprout "I'm sorry, professor, but I think I'm not feeling well. Can I go to the Hospital Wing?"

The professor looked rather surprised. Normally Audrey would be a quiet student, doing her chores silently and passing as unseen as she could. Most professors liked very much because of that – she worked well, was smart and never gave them trouble. "Oh, sure, Miss Blanchard. Do you need any assistance?"

"No, no, professor! I don't want to disturb anyone. I think it's just something that I had eaten", and she slipped out of her class before the professor could even know what to do with her. But she never went to the Hospital Wing – oh no, Audrey stuffed her hands in her pockets, fighting the chilling winds of November and walked fast to Hagrid's house, where she could see him outside with a big dog that looked it could chop off her head.

"You are like me", she said, starting him, who turned to look at her a bit confuse. "You are a half-breed".

At it, the gatekeeper looked rather disturbed. "What are yer talkin' about, girl? Shouldn't yer be in class?", and turned away from her rather clumsy, the big dog watching her closely.

"My mother is a veela", she said before she could stop herself, and Hagrid stopped suddenly at her voice. "I'm a half-veela, and I've been hiding it my whole life because dad said it was dangerous, and I've never met anyone like me – like us – before. But you aren't like the others, are you? You are like me. One of your parents, or grandparents – I don't know how long this can be kept in bloodline – was _something_ else. And they say to us to keep it as secret, and I'm so scared _all the time,_ and I just…".

It was like she couldn't stop herself, and the words that she never had spoken aloud – about her mom and the fact that her dad would do anything to keep her as his own secret, and how people couldn't _know_ because what a _shame_ to have a half-breed as a daughter!

Not a total monster, but not human either. Something _below_ it.

Hagrid looked at her like he was seeing a ghost, and for a second, she was sure he was going to scream and send her back to the castle crying. Or maybe thrown her in the Forest, so some complete beast could tear her apart.

It took a minute. Two, maybe, but he finally said, terrible slowly, "I think it's better if ya get inside. I'll make some tea".

Hagrid never talked to her about what he was, after all. But he listened as she talked endlessly about how scared she was all the time since she could remember asking her dad why a boy had fallen of his chair because _her, a_ nd how she knew her inheritance would only get w _orse_ than would as she got.

"Yer are Ezra's daughter", Hagrid said. "I remember him. Used to walk by the corridors always with at least ten other kids. Never meet a kid as popular as he was".

Audrey smiled at that, while Hagrid put her some tea. "Yeah, sounds like him. Still have more friends than you think is possible. I'm sorry for barging at your door like that".

She patted Fang; whose big head was happily in her lap. He was a nice dog, even if a bit agitated when he had noted Cat scent all over her. "No problem, kid. But do yer think yer could…"

"Don't talk to anyone? Yes. Better if they don't know".

Hagrid looked rather sadly at her but didn't say anything else. When she had calmed herself enough, Hagrid sent her back to the castle, but he had the heart to invite her to come over anytime she wanted.

Audrey knew she wouldn't.

Why should she?

* * *

Audrey always liked Christmas. Her dad would spend the day mostly wasted since she could remember, but besides that, her Christmas were most fun. She would get lots of gifts, her nannies would let stay up until later and eat whatever she wanted, and her best friends would usually come over and play. Decembers were never very cold at home, either, so she could still play outside; but, despite her best efforts to remain positive, Blanchard's Christmas in this side of the ocean weren't as fun.

Evelyn had got her new dresses as a gift, and they were lovely but would be wasted since she had to use uniform at school and would probably outgrow them by the time the summer came around. Her grandpa had given her a nice pair of shoes and a beautiful jewellery box that had belonged to her aunt, Eloise. Audrey had received her dad's gifts too – new books, a new leather glove and a card promising to buy her a new broom when she came back in the summer. Sophie had bought her a box of sugar quills and a neat new colouring book.

She was happy with all of it. There wasn't anything else she wanted except some fun – because Blanchard House, despite being huge, was boring. Her grandmother liked to keep it in perfect state, always clean enough to shine, and Audrey was forbidden to do anything that could litter her precious home. Besides that, their grandparents spent their holidays in business meetings, fancy dinners, and boring evenings.

But she discovered a new favourite of hers – spending her days reading in her grandfather' office, while he slowly worked over sheets and documents from the family' business. Audrey discovered that she liked the little inputs he would give her about business, the tell-tales he would tell between a document and another, working endlessly in his little, homely office that smelled of candles and old parchment.

Charles Blanchard was at least ten years older than his wife and had already lost most of the movements of his legs due some gruesome accident in the First War. But Audrey discovered that she liked him very much – he was patient and lenient with her little quirks and would often agree to anything that she asked as long as it seemed safe and sound.

He also had been thrilled to hear that Audrey was in Slytherin – the first Blanchard since him to make into the snake's pit. "Some people would disregard us as a bunch of stupid, rich fellows who grab onto the old ways a bit too tight. But, despite the idiots that fill the Slytherin, I liked our house very much; no one see things like us, dear. We are strategists, always remember that".

She had been curled in one of his chairs like a cat, her head resting against the soft dark velvet while he spoke in his raspy voice, her hands busy with a new colouring book that Sophie had bought her as a Christmas gift. Then she remembered something she had heard Hermione asking Madam Pince in their last week at Hogwarts.

"Grandpa, do you know who Nicolas Flamel was? I read his name in the Library but never had heard of him before".

He hesitated for a second, takings his grey eyes – the same eyes that Audrey's dad had – from an awfully long piece of parchment. "Are you saying you never had heard of Nicolas Flamel? Don't they teach Alchemy at Hogwarts anymore?"

"Not at the first year", she shrugged. "They did back at your time?"

"Of course they did, but I suppose even then most of the wizards would regard it as an outdated branch of magic. I hadn't seen an alchemist for decades now, but Nicolas Flamel is the most famous one. He created the Philosopher' Stone, whose elixir could prolong someone's life for years. If you think I'm old, you should see Mr. Flamel, darling".

Audrey narrowed her eyes. What was Hermione Granger doing, trying to find who Nicolas Flamel was?

"Nice", she dismissed. What are the Gryffindors doing _now?_ "Can I get some cookies?"

But her mind was far away from cookies.

* * *

Hermione Granger never had been one to trust easily. Maybe was because she always had been an odd child, more perceptive than was healthy and whose time were more waste on books and science than on games and dolls. But the fact was that Hermione Granger was as sceptical as an eleven-year-old could be.

But she always had been a good judge of character. As a girl and a muggleborn in a world that most oftener than not was rude to a muggleborn, she had quickly grasped who's she could trust and the ones she couldn't. Often, the ones she _couldn't_ have a green tie tightly against their necks.

However, Audrey Blanchard was a completely different story. She was a bit weird, of course – but wasn't like Hermione wasn't – and she had this strange habit of smiling almost all the time, like the world was a joke that only her could understand. She was also the almost perfect stereotype of the girl who would pick on Hermione in the school – pretty and rich and clearly _spoiled_.

But the truth was that Audrey Blanchard, the girl with a muggle actress name, probably didn't care enough about almost anything, and therefore didn't care for anyone blood status. She was nice and friendly to anyone, an oddity in the middle of a snake' pit. Hermione would more often see her around reading her strange, useless books than consorting with other Slytherin friends.

But even if Audrey was all those things, what made Hermione accept her was the fact that Audrey never seemed one to ask many questions. She accepted things easily, never questioned them and never seemed extremely interested in anyone else's business.

If you wanted to tell her, fine. If not, she would quickly move onto the next thing that grabbed her attention – normally one of the ribbons that she liked to use in her hair, a new pop song she would murmur while studying (how the hell a supposed-pureblood-Slytherin knew Cyndi Lauper?) or a muggle teen fiction that was a bit inappropriate for their age.

That was Audrey. More like a breeze passing around people than anything else, always a bit disconnected of everything, like the real world couldn't hold her attention for much long.

What Hermione had – probably by her own choice – ignored was the fact that Audrey was smart. Hauntingly smart.

And, of course, from all the business she could get suddenly interested into, of course she would choose Hermione's.

She had been in her first week back at Hogwarts after the holidays when Audrey found her in the library. The girl had her blonde hair pulled in a tight ponytail with a nice velvet-green ribbon, in perfect coordination with her Slytherin colours, and, as always, was carrying one of her silly books.

Hermione had been with Ron and Harry trying to find something – anything – about Nicolas Flamel all over again, so unsuccessfully that could make anyone to loss their blind faith into books – except by Hermione, because she truly believed, by heart, that the Library had the answer to anything in the world.

But Audrey stopped beside them, balancing on her toes in the way she often did, and more than one time had made the boys compare her to an overgrow little bird. "Hello Audrey", Hermione said, while Ron stayed as silently as he could. He never had been very accepting of the girl, even though she always had been perfectly cordial to him.

"I know who Nicolas Flamel is".

Ron almost fell out of his chair, Hermione chocked, and Harry cursed.

Audrey smiled.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: good news: i finished writing the first book!  
> thanks to everyone who is reading!


	6. 005

**V**

Audrey always thought that the Gryffindors were rather funny – Hermione's friends even more. Ronald Weasley couldn't, by life of his, find any kind of grace. He lacked tact social and Audrey could pay to see her grandmother having to be in the same space than him – Audrey could bet in who would get mad first. He was crude and rude, and she liked to push his buttons.

It was easy. She only had to use her slytherin uniform and see him get angry instantly.

Harry Potter was another story.

Of course, she knew who he was before. She had heard all kind of story, even more since arriving in London in August; and back then she had pictured him in a lot of ways, and none of them lived up to reality.

Harry was almost a head shorter than her and was so skinny that he looked at least two years younger. His hair was always a mess, but he had nice eyes, and even if his despise for anything-Slytherin-related was obvious, he mostly kept it to himself. On the only occasions she had talked to him, Potter had been polite and kind. She supposed he was cute in the same way that a puppy would be.

But, again, both were terrible funny.

Their reactions _even_ funnier.

"You WHAT?", Weasley said, loudly enough to make Madam Pince angry. He lowered his voice and went back to Hermione, sounding angry as hell, "did you told her?!"

"No!", Hermione answered quickly. "Audrey, how you do know about it?!"

"You aren't as subtle as you like to think when asking Madam Pince about it", Audrey shrugged and pushed a chair to sit down. She rested her chin on her hands and pretended the best thoughtful face she could; Ron seemed to get even angrier.

"Had you been eavesdropping on us?", he asked. "You little…"

"Hey!", Audrey called, but she wanted to laugh. "I wouldn't call eavesdropping. More like hearing how loud a Gryffindor can talk. That's completely not my fault if you start talking by my side like I'm a stupid slug. Besides, you keep being rude to me, I'm not going to help".

"We don't need _your help!",_ Weasley was getting increasingly outraged, like the fact of Audrey knowing something he didn't was terribly offensive.

She opened her mouth to give one hell of a sassy remark, but Potter beat her up. "Who is he?"

Audrey blinked at him. "What?"

"Who is he? You said you know. So, who is Nicolas Flamel?"

Audrey smiled prettily at him – the _smile_ – and Potter's eyes grew the size of a plate. "Not so quickly, Potter. There's something you three could do for me".

Potter grunted, but Ron looked murderous. "Of course, you little snake, of course you would want something. I bet you want him to not play in the next quidditch game so Slytherin can win the Cup!"

Audrey frowned. "…What?", she blinked at least twice before getting back in the tracks. "No! Ok, listen, I couldn't care _less_ about the Cup, honestly. To the hell with that. But there's something I need and you three can help me".

Hermione took a second to think, before she sighed. "What you want, Audrey?". She looked terrible disappointed, like Betty Fairchild when Audrey had the first place in the list of The Prettiest Girls in The Class.

"You know how gryffindors hate slytherins, right? So, this is the problem. We firsties are the easiest target, and your dear veterans aren't going easy and us – me and Sophie – had gotten the worse because we don't have a pack to rely on. So, if some of them see me around you three – specially you, Potter – they could think I'm cool and all that, and maybe they will stop. This is all I'm asking".

"You want help to be left alone?", Harry asked, slowly. "How bad are you two getting it?"

Audrey thought for a second, absently playing with a lock of blonde hair. "Bad. Sophie already got into three detentions because she doesn't stop getting into fights, and we are in the first year. She can't know I'm asking it, because she is too proud, but will help if the gryffindors start liking me – and, by extension liking her, and what better way than be friends with the boy-who-lived, hero of quidditch, etcetera? Besides, no one is going to mess up with us if we are around you three"

Harry looked rather uncomfortable by it, and Hermione was a bit dazed. Ron was furious. "Get lost, Blanchard. We don't need you".

"Oh, you do", she said. "Because you aren't going to find Flamel that easy. Really, Weasley, I just want to get away from those bullies of yours. I'm not even going to ask why you want to know about Flamel so badly!".

"Deal", Potter said, and extended his hand to her, even if looked like someone selling his soul to the devil. "You can hang around us. Can you please tell us about Flamel now?"

Audrey shake his hand a bit and smiled sincerely by the first time in that week. "Oh, of course. Deal is deal, right? Anyway, the thing about Flamel: he is old. My grandpa said he is a famous alchemist, like, old as a mummy, because he created something called the Philosopher's Stone, that can make you immortal and awfully rich. Isn't cool?"

Potter looked like he had taken a shock, and Audrey could swear his eyes were as big as his glasses. "Oh no", he said, "that's bad".

"Why?", Audrey pouted. "Oh fine, not my problem. Do you want me to leave now? Because I can leave now".

"Yes, please!", Ron said loudly.

Hermione jumped on her feet, her long, bushy hair bouncing wildly. She looked really, really excited – Audrey didn't think she had ever seen her as excited as that, but before the girl could say anything, she had sprinted down the corridors of the library. Audrey watched her go for a second. The boys looked at each other.

"Should I get worried?", Audrey asked. "Did I say something wrong?"

"Oh no, you just are _born_ wrong", Ron said acidly. He didn't know, of course he didn't, but that stung hard. Audrey sucked on air.

"Leave her alone, Ron", Harry said, apparently noticing that something was wrong – like Audrey almost hexing Ron into oblivion despite having no idea about how doing it. _He doesn't know, he doesn't know,_ she told herself.

"I'm going. See you around, Harry!", Audrey said cheerfully, almost too cheerfully.

She ran away from the library.

Her mind was swirling in a thousand of directions and none of them were good.

* * *

"Are you going to the match?", Sophie asked while they worked in the Potion's class. Audrey had put her hair in a tight bun, not wanting it to get burned or worse while working with a cauldron. Sophie was by her side, careful measuring the ingredients – they had come to a silent agreement that Audrey would mix and stir things, while Sophie worked with anything that needed to be measured.

"I don't know. Slytherin isn't playing, why should I go?", Audrey said, carefully mixing the potion in clockwise direction, like Snape had said. "Are you?"

"Because it's fun, fat-head. C'mon, if you don't go, I'm going to have to sit with Pansy!".

Audrey waited to reply because Snape passed by their desk, his dark eyes critically looking at the way that they worked. Audrey smiled at him, but was useless – her charm, normally unstoppable against adults, never worked in Snape. He kept looking as sour as always.

" _Fine._ Why do you want to see all the games so badly?"

"I want to play next year", Sophie said, throwing some roots into their potion. "Chaser or seeker, I think. I need to know what I'm going against".

Audrey never played quidditch well. Her father had been a beater when a teenager, played for Hufflepuff and all that, but his love for the sport hadn't been passed unto her – Audrey could fly pretty well, but throw a ball while doing it was completely another story. Besides, bludgers scared the hell out of her. "Do you know how many players became disfigured because of quidditch?"

"Do you want something cooler than a quidditch's scar?"

Audrey frowned. "I would prefer to keep my good looks, thank you very much".

"Whatever you say, prom queen", Sophie rolled her eyes, as she often did with Audrey. "I think we finished".

Audrey slowly got a little flask of their potion, signed their names on it and closed it carefully.

"What's the deal with Potter and Weasley?", Sophie murmured to her, narrowing her green eyes. "They keep looking at us and whispering something. Do you think they are going to try something? Oh, would be _so_ fun punching the golden-boy's face. I bet Malfoy would do my homework until I graduate".

"No, he wouldn't. God forbid someone hurt the target of his undying passion", Audrey snickered. "And don't worry about them. They were cool, mostly".

"Do you still with that idea of yours about Malfoy being in love with Potter?"

"Absolutely", Audrey confirmed. "The whole enemies-turned-lovers dynamics. Just wait until we get older".

Sophie had to hold back her laughter.

* * *

The afternoon of the match was a boring one. The weather hadn't got much better, to Audrey despair, and she had to put her best coat to fight off the cold. Sophie was almost hopping on her feet while they made their way out of the castle, arms intertwined. Audrey's head was already hurting when they arrived because Sophie couldn't stop talking about all the things she would do next year, when she would be able to have her own broom.

Her dad had promised her a Nimbus or something like that – Audrey had no idea at all about broom's brands, so she just agreed when Sophie discussed the benefits of having a Nimbus, like Potter's.

When Sophie started making a beeline to where Daphne Greengrass was sitting, Audrey held her back and turned them to the other side, where she could see Ron's red hair shining under the sun. Sophie seemed horrified when she saw that Audrey was leading them unto Gryffindor territory, but Audrey paid her no mind.

"Hi Hermione, hi Ron", Audrey said happily, throwing herself by their sides. Then she saw Neville there, his eyes as big they could get and fixed on Sophie. "Hi Neville. How is Trevor?"

"Uh, nice. I thought I had lost him yesterday, but he was just under Dean's bed", the boy said, and Audrey nodded, but his eyes were still locked into Sophie.

Just for precaution, she had kept Cat safely locked up in Slytherin's dungeon as much as she could – the fact that most of the other's slytherins girls liked her cat was just a bonus.

"Blanchard", Ron said grumpily, but Hermione smiled at her, so Audrey thought that everything was fine.

That was when things started getting complicated, because Audrey's least favourite housemate choose this time to arrive. Draco Malfoy was the biggest drama queen she had ever met, having as his favourite catchphrase the infamous "I'm going to tell my father!". Audrey thought he was a _brat,_ and that was something since she had been raised around spoiled children since she could remember. Draco was a mix of evil, chaos and nice blonde hair.

"Wonder how long Potter's going to stay on his broom this time? Anyone want a bet? What about you, Weasley?", he said to Ron, his voice dripping venom. Audrey looked worriedly at Hermione, but she was just as transfixed by the game as Sophie, who had been screaming as loudly as her lungs could.

"You know how I think they choose people for the Gryffindor team? It's people they feel sorry for. See, there's Potter, who's got no parents, then there's the Weasleys, who've got no money — you should be on the team, Longbottom, you've got no brains."

Audrey sucked on air and held onto Ron's arm, but he had his eyes fixed onto the game as much as the other girls. Audrey was getting anxious – that wasn't how she planned to spent her afternoon – she didn't even want to come to the blasted match, why couldn't she had stayed reading safely inside her dorms?

But what surprised her the most was Neville – who was more of a bunny than a lion – standing by himself.

"I'm worth twelve of you, Malfoy," he stammered.

Audrey gulped. What was she supposed to do? She had no idea about how break up a fight.

"You're in luck, Weasley, Potter's obviously spotted some money on the ground!" said Malfoy.

And then everything went to hell. Ron jumped out of Audrey's gaze, and went directly to Malfoy like a cat jumping on his prey. Audrey's screamed but no one heard her – except by Neville, who jumped over his seat to help Ron. Audrey managed a few of "Stop it!", but it was as useful as swinging a white flag.

However, something snapped _hard_ inside her. She felt it before she knew what was, and her voice sounded louder than usually it was, and the feeling of magic, running in her veins – not normal, common magic, that was warm and safe, but magic nonetheless. She had always felt her magic swirling just under her skin, asking to be free, but nothing like that.

It was like having ice, sharp and cold, burning into her bones.

"Stop it NOW!"

The boys stopped their fight and looked over her, a bit confused about what was happening, a dazed look into their eyes. Ron had an ugly nosebleed, but Malfoy probably wasn't going to open his right eye for a while; Neville was a mess of newly made bruises and scratches, while Crabbe and Goyle looked rather unscathed.

Sophie looked at Audrey, suddenly extremely interested. "How in hell you did that?"

Audrey's dad always had told her that she had the freedom of telling him anything. Before, she never had the necessity of hiding anything from her dad – from her little mischievous at school to childhood crushes, she would happily tell him anything because her dad was more of a friend than a parent. She trusted him with her life easily, and never ever had her told him a lie.

She knew she was supposed to tell him what happened at the game – when she had made five fighting boys pay attention to her. Audrey knew deep down that he was supposed to know and tell her if what was happening was normal or not.

But she didn't.

She locked it up deep inside her, deep enough to fool herself as if nothing had happened.

"I still have bursts of magic sometimes", she had lied by the skin of her teeth to Sophie. If anyone asked, that was also what she was going to say.

Because what more was there to say? She had no idea at all about what was happening to her.

Maybe was a mom's thing.

But, honestly, Audrey would rather not know.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: so this a new chapter. i've already written all of the first book and i'm finishing the second one, so i can keep up frequently updates for now. anyway, what do you think of it? do you like audrey? i would love to know! also, this chapters had a bug or something like that and wouldn't show at all, so I had to post it twice. Sorry about that!  
> with love,  
> star


	7. 006

**VI**

Harry had made sure to follow his side of their deal.

It took a while to Audrey notice it, but sometimes he would sit by her side in their shared classes, to Sophie displeasure, who would then have to move over and sit with Daphne. Audrey didn't mind it – Harry was nice and fun, and never complained when she asked him to help her with the time or the pages of a book. Sometimes he would drag Hermione and a rather reluctant Ron to sit with her and Sophie while they worked together in the Library or in the Grounds, and no one would comment on it.

He was rather smart and had an interesting temperament, willing to snap in sassy remarks that would make Audrey crack a tiny smile; she supposed that, under different circumstances, they would have been rather good friends.

But, mostly part, both would work in complete opposite sides of Hogwarts.

Was a nice agreement.

Until she discovered that Harry Potter – nice eyes and all – was a magnet for trouble.

Audrey had been in the Library working in all the content she had procrastinated after her grandmother had sent her a copy of _Stranger With My Face_ by Lois Duncan, when she found Hagrid clumsy looking for something that he apparently couldn't find easily.

"Hello", she said carefully, because she hadn't talked with Hagrid since her outburst of finding that he was also a half-breed. "Do you need any help?"

He almost jumped, before seeing it was just her. "Oh, hi, Audrey. How are yer? I hope no one is givin' yer trouble, eh?"

Audrey smiled tightly. "Nope, everything is fine. So… What are you looking for?"

He looked rather uncomfortable – but again, Audrey liked the Library very much and had never seen him around there. It was like watching her father without his flashy clothes or Audrey without one of her hair ribbons.

Misplaced.

"Yer are good with secrets, aren't yer, Audrey? Well, I… Yer can't tell anyone, but where can I find dragon' books?"

He said it very quickly and incredibly low, like someone would jump behind one of the shelves and point a finger at him telling he had committed a terrible crime. Audrey frowned and rocked on her toes a bit. "You are on the wrong session. The magic animals are two shelves over there; But I don't think they still have much about dragons 'cause they are forbidden in Britain, aren't they? I know we have some breeders in America, but not here".

"Yeh, yeh, not here", he said quickly. "Thank yer, Audrey. The tea invite 'till standing, if yer want. See yer!"

And then he left her there like it was nothing.

Audrey had never been more confused in her life.

She discovered what was happening the next day, by anyone else's than Malfoy.

Audrey always had tried extremely hard to not dwell on grudges, don't hate people and things like that. She always did, because her dad had taught her that it was futile and would later come to bit her in the ass – her grandmother had almost had a stroke when she had said ass.

But Malfoy made all those things terrible difficult.

She and Sophie arrived in their common room after dinner. Sophie had been excited because she had made the best spell in their DADA class, almost skipping steps in their way back at the dungeons. Audrey was still confused by why Hagrid wanted to read about dragons of all things – he had never seemed as a reader-type of person, but who was she to judge?

When she found out Malfoy, he was laughing, laughing and hard with his two gorilla-like friends. Audrey felt a bad feeling at it, because when had ever Malfoy been happy because of anything good for the rest of the humankind?

"What's the joke, Draco?", she asked as sweetly as she could, her fingers playing with the rim of her skirt. Audrey was the spiting image of innocence itself.

The boy looked rather smuggle, like he had got the chance of winning an Oscar or something like that. Audrey's heart skipped a beat.

"Look at it, Blanchard!", he said, extending her a piece of parchment. "That buffoon is getting in real trouble now!"

She got the parchment with trembling hands. Has Malfoy been planning to end whose life this time?

Her best bet was always on his undying passion, Harry Potter, but she could never be so sure. Either way, while Malfoy never had been as smart as he liked to think, so she shouldn't be really worried, but Malfoy still was a cute-looking devil spawn, so was better to not underestimate him.

"Dear Ron,

How are you? Thanks for the letter — I'd be glad to take the

Norwegian Ridgeback, but it won't be easy getting him here. I

think the best thing will be to send him over with some friends of

mine who are coming to visit me next week. Trouble is, they

mustn't be seen carrying an illegal dragon.

Could you get the Ridgeback up the tallest tower at midnight on

Saturday? They can meet you there and take him away while it's

still dark.

Send me an answer as soon as possible.

Love,

Charlie"

Her heart stopped and suddenly her mind clicked, and everything made much more sense _now._ Of course, Hagrid had been reading about dragons – he had got himself a dragon, in the middle of Britain, where they are prohibited and they could get him into serious trouble.

And _of course_ the magnanimous trio would want to help.

"How you know this isn't a joke, Draco?", she said, extending him the parchment. "An illegal dragon? Wouldn't someone had seen a dragon in Hogwarts already? There are at least a hundred students, plus the staff. How someone would hide a dragon here?"

Her heart was on her throat. By her side, Sophie looked rather confused of why she was putting herself in the middle of one of the Draco's problems – Audrey had never shown any love towards the boy. But Draco was beyond reason now.

"They aren't that smart, Blanchard! Why don't you go say goodbye to your little bloodtraitor friend? He isn't going to be at Hogwarts for breakfast, after all".

Oh, no. They were all going to be at Hogwarts for breakfast.

* * *

Sophie had kept nagging at her for why was she so worried, and Audrey had promised to tell her – tomorrow, when Audrey would come with a good lie that didn't involve saving Hagrid, the only other half-breed she knew, from whatever Britain did with people who broke the law.

She had picked one of her pink notepads, take a sheet and wrote the best and shorter she could – "Devil spawn knows. I'll try to hold him. _Holly Golightly_ ", folded it and glued it around Cat's neck using a sticky spell and a hair-ribbon. Satisfied with her work, she looked directly into Cat's eyes.

"Do you remember Hermione?", she said, at which Cat meowed. "You have to find her, okay? Only her. No one else. Stay around the Gryffindor Tower, until she gets out, if you can't get inside. Can you do it?"

Of course, it was a huge shot, but Cat was a magic familiar as much as owls were. They were supposed to be smarter than common animals, and Cat always had been especially curious. And, in the worst case, if someone found her note it was not like they would understand what she was saying.

Cat looked at her curious.

"Please, Cat. Just do it. I'll buy you all the new toys I can if you do it, ok?"

Looking satisfied with her payment, Cat jumped out of her bed and went quickly in her way out. Audrey cursed and thought what she was going to do to stop Malfoy.

Her head started hurting badly, sending waves of pain into her skull – Audrey had sure it was sorely caused by stress.

She waited until all the girls were clearly sleeping to finally get up, put a robe over her pyjamas and her boots – the most silent shoes she had – and tiptoe out of her dorm, and finally out of the common room. The corridors of the dungeons were darker than she had ever seen, and colder too – she hated it – but that wasn't what was worrying her.

Was getting into the tower quickly enough, preferably before Malfoy.

She found him in the middle of the way.

He was slipping over the corridors beneath the Astronomy Tower like a cat, the moonlight escaping by the windows making his hair look even paler than hers; Audrey took a moment before taking her wand and whispering " _Tarantallegra_ ", as quietly as she could.

Malfoy started dancing – and doing a hell of a noise, enough to make her cringe. What had she done?

And that was how McGonagall found them, getting Audrey into her first detention.

* * *

Audrey cried herself to sleep that night.

She had never, ever got into real trouble before. She had made accidental magic, broken things and got into minor accidents, but not even near enough trouble to something like detention. She had never been so scared in her life than by the moment where McGonagall woke Snape to tell him about Audrey and Draco – and Snape had been livid.

She went back to the dungeons with her chest hurting, a brooding Draco Malfoy, and tears burning in her throat. Audrey had hold them down enough to get back to her bed, where she started crying like she rarely did. At some point she must have wakened the other girls, because Sophie opened the curtains of her bed and laid down beside Audrey before closing it again.

"What happened?"

Audrey cried even more.

"I got in really, really bad trouble", she whispered, trying to stop the tears. "I tried to h-help, but I-I was so stupid!".

She wasn't making much sense, so Sophie let her be and stayed in her bed trying to comfort her until Audrey finally, finally fell asleep – only to dream with the disappointed eyes of her grandmother. She hated it.

In the morning after the whole mess, she woke up to find Cat lazily laying at her top, and with the Sophie looking rather started. "What happened, Audrey? Gryffindor lost a hundred and fifty points, and everyone is trying to find why".

Audrey was exhausted and too guilty to think in any life-saving lie, so she went to the close she could to the straight-up true: Harry, Ron and Hermione were in trouble because of Malfoy, and she tried to help them, get caught and had detention.

"You were crying that hard because you got detention?", Sophie asked. "Audrey. It's just detention, I got it all the time. Besides, we are going to win the House Cup now that Gryffindor went down".

"I have never got into trouble before", Audrey sniffed. "You know how I would usually smile, and everyone agrees with me? Yeah, I never get into trouble, but now I'm in big trouble. Evelyn is going to be so mad".

Sophie had the audacity to laugh.

"C'mon, prom queen. I promise you will survive, it's just one detention – you will probably have to write some lines or whatever. Can we have breakfast now?"

Audrey almost crawled to the Great Hall. There, everyone was talking, and the word got away fast – but, to her surprise, people were talking only about the fact that Gryffindor had lost 150 points thanks to Harry Potter – who seemed more miserable than Audrey herself, who had lost forty-five points for Slytherin.

Just because she hexed Draco. Snape would dismiss almost everything, except a snake attacking another.

At least the exams weren't far away, which meant Audrey had the perfect excuse to hid as much as she wanted in the library – a mission where Sophie refused to accompany her, because she was in ecstasy with the fact that Slytherin was going to win.

The library was where Audrey found Hermione, Harry and Ron, safely hidden behind a tower of books. Audrey put her things down, sat down and asked – "Are you ok?".

Hermione took a time before replying, occupied with writing furiously into the parchment. "Yeah", she said, then stopped. But was Harry who looked her in the eye and said, "Thanks, by the way, _Holly Golightly_ ".

Audrey smiled.

Things couldn't be that bad, could they?

* * *


End file.
